Hailed by Jeremy Nicholas in the Gramophone magazine as “one of the most consistently inspired, masterfully executed and beautiful-sounding versions I can recall” and being included in Gramophone’s list of 10 greatest Chopin recordings, Zlata Chochieva came to international attention with her disc of Complete Chopin Etudes along with recordings of Rachmaninov.

Since then, she has become known for her distinctive voice amongst pianists and appeared regularly at many prestigious concert halls, festivals and with major orchestras and conductors.

For her second album with naïve, im freien, Zlata Chochieva has chosen a magnificent, audacious program, associating Schumann, Ravel, Liszt and Bartók with the lesser known Draeseke and Schulz-Evler.

Sensitive to nature and to the emotions it inspires, the Russian pianist has conceived this very personal album as a patchwork, sometimes inward-looking, landscape with changing skies.

“A recorded program is not a concert program, but I also wanted to tell a story, propose a whole tapestry of emotions, open different perspectives,” she confides.

From Schumann’s very Romantic Waldszenen to the powerful Ravelian cycle which makes up the heart of the program, right up to the most mythical and mystical nature of Liszt, and Bartók’s mysterious nocturnal music, Chochieva navigates through a wide diversity of climates, perceptions, and feelings expressed by their relationship with nature. And it is here where Chochieva finds plenty of substance, revealing a temperament both ardent and delicate, where her playing is at once poetically virtuoso, in keeping with the demands of this captivating program.

The pianist also includes some less familiar pieces, like the Petite Histoire by Draeseke, a composer she considers to be a major discovery, who admired Liszt and Wagner, and Adolf Schulz-Evler’s Arabesque, written on the theme of Strauss’s Beautiful Blue Danube with strong Liszt style undertones.

CD 1:
ROBERT SCHUMANN (1810–1856)
Scènes de la forê op. 82
1. Entrée
2. Chasseurs aux aguets
3. Fleurs solitaires
4. Lieu maudit
5. Paysage souriant
6. Auberge
7. Oiseau-prophète
8. Chant de chasse
9. Adieu

Schumann’s Waldszenen (aka Forest scenes) is a cycle of fragments, written in a matter of days over New Year, 1849; it was his last major cycle for solo piano. The forest that it explores was a subject close to the heart of any self-respecting Romantic, be they writer, poet, artist or musician.

Here, Zlata Chochieva opens his Scènes de la forê op. 82 works on the tacitly warm Entrée before bringing us the fervently charged Chasseurs aux aguets, and then we are brought forth the luxuriously sumptuous Fleurs solitaires, the playful Lieu maudit, the sprightly, almost organic Paysage souriant, the strident, yet dulcetly coltish Aubergem, before the recording rounds out on the ornate elegance of Oiseau-prophète, the emphatic Chant de chasse, closing on the comfortably opulent Adieu.

MAURICE RAVEL (1875-1937)
Miroirs
10. Noctuelles
11. Oiseaux tristes
12. Une barque sur l’océan
13. Alborada del grancioso
14. La vallée des cloches

Miroirs (aka Reflections) is a suite for solo piano written by French impressionist composer Maurice Ravel between 1904 and 1905, first performed by Ricardo Viñes in 1906.

Chochieva opens the work here on the veritably glistening Noctuelles and follows that up with the pure twinkling, almost ethereal innocence within Oiseaux tristes, the free flowing, magically-hued Une barque sur l’océan, the recording coming to a close on the perky one minute, precocious the next Alborada del grancioso and finally the acquiescent, unobtrusiveness stillness within La vallée des cloches.

CD 2:
FRANZ LISZT (1835-1886)
Scènes de la forê op. 82
1. Feux follets (etudes d’exécution transcendante, S.139, no. 5)
2. chasse-neige (etudes d’execution transcendante S.139, no. 12)

The second CD opens with Liszt’s most technically challenging Transcendental Études (tone poems in all but name). Here, Chochieva flows without fear into the first piece, the exceptionally flirtatious, wholly animated, and vibrantly sculptured Feux follets (etudes d’exécution transcendante, S.139, No. 5), and closes the work on the scintillating, simply divine, and magnificently cradled chasse-neige (etudes d’execution transcendante S.139, no. 12).

FELIX DRAESEKE (1835-1913)
petite histoire op. 9
3. Rêve de bonheur
4. Intermezzo
5. Incertitude

Draeseke was a composer of the New German School admiring Franz Liszt and Richard Wagner. He wrote compositions in most forms including eight operas and stage works, four symphonies, and much vocal and chamber music.

Here on his petite histoire op. 9, Chochieva opens with the stirring, melodically-stylized Rêve de bonheur, before bringing us the flowingly embroidered Intermezzo, closing on the warming embrace found within the gently assertive, yet knowingly restrained Incertitude.

ADOLF SCHULZ-EVLER (1852-1905)
6. arabesques sur un thème du Beau Danube bleu un de johann strauss

The penultimate recording is the Schulz-Evler transcription Blue Danube, which has an original rich history of itself, of course. A sense of fluctuating, veritably winged, yet contained exhuberance leads the work, whilst a mid-section brings with it a more cultured standpoint, the ending a strident, yet dulcet-hued work of musical art elegance.

BÉLA BARTÓK (1881-1945)
7. musiques nocturnes en plein air sz.81 no. 4

The whole recording culminates with The Night’s Music, the fourth of Bartók’s Out of Doors, a cycle of five tone piano poems from 1926 that gives this program its title (Out of Doors - Hungarian: Szabadban, German: Im Freien, French: En Plein Air).

Among the very few instrumental compositions by Bartók with programmatic titles, Chochieva opens it with an inviting, yet acutely unsettling backdrop, which moves seamlessly into a more dewy, accepting posture of the rural, nocturnal soundscape it imagines, closing on a slow elegance within its final breathe.

“I have always felt close to nature,” Chocieva explains. “When my life was turned upside down during the pandemic, when I couldn’t travel, or even meet people, I realized that it is the natural world that energizes me the most. It is my greatest source of inspiration, and answers many of the questions I have.”

“That was when I began to learn Ravel’s ‘Miroirs’, which became a Polestar for me to create this very special personal programme that I’m very happy to share with all of you now!It’s about marvelous, thrilling journey starting from Schumann’s ‘Waldszenen’ and ending with Bartok’s ‘The Night’s Music’. Through dreams of happiness, as well as experiencing mystic, fantastic aspects of nature, feel of uncertainty and anxiety.”

“Today, I’m trilled to announce my second album with naïve – ‘Im Freien’ – with the program, including Schumann, Ravel, Liszt, Schulz-Evler and Bartók with the lesser known Felix Draeseke who became a major recent discovery for me.”

Chochieva was born in Moscow and is now a resident of Berlin. Her teachers have included Mikhail Pletnev at the Central Special Music School and Pavel Nersessian at the Moscow State Conservatory. Subsequently, Chochieva completed two years of postgraduate studies under Professor Jacques Rouvier at the Mozarteum University of Salzburg where she was his assistant for several years.

Having acquired many international competition prizes over the years, Chochieva moves on from competing and often joins the jury, and was part of the esteemed panel for the 15th Geza Anda Competition in Zurich.

Chochieva established the International Festival at Rachmaninov’s estate in Ivanovka and has been Director since 2018.

Zlata Chochieva - Petite Histoire, Op. 9: No. 1, Rêve de bonheur [Official Music Video]

Official Website